With our contestants’ armies really starting to take shape for the Arena of Escalation, it was time to up the stakes with something a little larger, something monstrous if you will. I’m of course talking about a centrepiece model! While not all armies need them, they definitely add a bit of visual oomph to your collection, and Warhammer 40,000 by Games Workshop certainly have plenty of great models to pick from.
Armed with Warpaints Fanatic, Warpaints Air, and Speedpaint, our contestants added a variety of centrepieces to their collections, some monstrous, some mechanical, and some a little unassuming - such are the vagaries of the dreaded “real life” impeding upon our precious hobby time.
Steffen: I knew as soon as I started the army that my centrepiece was going to be the venerable Avatar of Kaela Mensha Khaine – The Eldar god of war also known as the bloody-handed.
I love the concept of this giant ornate statue coming to life – possessed by the essence of a god through blood sacrifice and literally burning with anger. It doesn’t get cooler than that! The first thing I did was to remove all the sculpted flames on the model, as I think the mini looks much better without them. I chose the classic double-crested helmet and sword combo, as to me it is the ultimate look for the Avatar. There are so many gorgeous paint jobs out there, and I really wanted to make mine stand out (which I hope I managed). Instead of going all in on the hot glowing look, I decided to tone it down a bit and keep it to only being visible in the molten cracks of his body, eyes, and mouth. I decided to not use orange on him elsewhere, and instead used Warpaints Fanatic Dark Emerald for his armour shaded with purple, to get the same green and purple hints I use on the rest of the army along with the bone white elements.
I needed the gems to really pop, so I painted them from black to white and glazed them with Speedpaint Shamrock Green for that super saturated green look. The gems were finished off with a tiny highlight of Warpaints Fanatic Electric Lime and some white dots for reflections, and some of them had a tiny bit of orange painted on as counter-reflections from his glowing body before they were all given a coat of gloss varnish. The iconic bloody hand was given some sharp highlights in white and then painted in Speedpaint Murder Scene followed by more white highlights and a coat of Warpaints Fanatic True Blood to give it that glistening look.
The base was painted to match the rest of the army using the approach shown in my Wraithlord video.
You can follow Steffen's progress on his Instagram @artificers_minis.
Oliver: When I had the brief for this part of our challenge, I thought the mighty XV104 Riptide Battlesuit would be the perfect centerpiece to paint. So, I did. And I loved it. In fact, I loved it so much that I started looking at the even mightier KV128 Stormsurge...
So, I painted a Stormsurge and oh my, how big stompy red robots are cool!
But I kinda felt bad for the Riptide now, so the natural thing to do was paint another Riptide to keep it company.
Yes, I know there is an even bigger Tau battlesuit.... and yes, the Earth Caste are slavering away at my hobby desk developing it as we speak... stay tuned!
You can follow more of Oliver’s progress over on his Instagram @liondalepainting
Erasmus: For my big centrepiece model, I have decided to paint..... The almighty Trukk! Costing a whopping 65 points it will take up 3.25% of my army and be sure to make my opponents regret that they ever agreed to a game!
Sorry for that, in all seriousness I had a lot of good ideas for my centrepiece, but as it so often does, something else got in the way.
This time it was some major upcoming tournaments on the Danish scene and the temptation for a new army was too big. Instead of painting my orks I completed an entire World Eaters army instead. This ended up taking up all my time, but I am pretty pleased with the result.
Now I just need to finish my ork project and I will have two newly completed armies in one year. Not the worst situation to be in, that is for sure.
Sofie: I had to do my first character, and it’s a bit smaller than the others. Being a first-time army assembler however, I wanted to do a character I knew I could finish and not get in over my head.
With that in mind, I painted Morvenn Vahl with Speedpaint Purple Swarm and Golden Armour as my main colours. For some of the more detailed work, such as her hair, I used our Fanatic range. Here I used thinned down Warpaints Fanatic Brainmatter Beige.
I really enjoy working with our paints, and with the Speedpaints I can go over my work more times when I mess up. I gave all the gold a Warpaints Fanatic Soft Tone wash for some extra definition.
This is a fun project, and going into autumn the weather is more appealing to staying inside and painting, at least for me.
Jonas: It all started with yoghurt. I found some fun small Japanese yoghurt bottles I thought were perfect as a silo of sorts or a container and I immediately imagined my Knight landing on top of them and crushing them under one foot. So, I used a heat gun and pressed one of my Knight’s feet down over it while it was still soft. I then crushed it even further and cut some tears in it. I finished the container by wrapping some thin brass around it to look like bands holding them together.
But when it came to posing it, I was not completely sold on how it would look coming down, so I changed it to something a little more classic and heavier, where the Knight is stepping up, beginning to raise the other leg. It is sort of changing direction mid-step and looking to the side to target something new on the battlefield. I then made some long purity seals from brass and Green Stuff and small skulls from my paladin kit to show the movement of the "miniature".
This is my first ever big Knight kit, and I loved making it. Now I'm just going to paint it, I'm contemplating doing a slight shift away from the rest of my army adding some cold Green in a House Vyroni style.
You can follow Jonas' progress on his Instagram @paphoved_design.
The parade of monsters and tanks is not over yet, as we still have Adam, Lasse, Tyler, Thomas, and Danni to go, so be sure to check back in on Thursday!
Be sure to check the Arena of Escalation hub for more updates in the future, as well as on our social media accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter (X), YouTube, and TikTok. You can also follow along on everyone's personal social media accounts with the hashtag #ArenaofEscalation.
